Stockhausen's Samstag aus Licht
Opera for 12 soloists (voice, 10 instrumentalists, dancer), wind ensemble, and men's choir with organ
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Cast
Damien Bigourdan
Nieto
Florent Derex
Pascale Lavandier
Myrtille Debièvre
Catherine Verheyde
Agathe Cemin
Damien Pass
Alphonse Cemin
Claire Luquiens
Julie Brunet-Jailly
Emmanuelle Grach
Henri Deléger
Mathieu Adam
Ayumi Taga
French Army Choir
Program notes
Maxime Pascal and his trailblazing ensemble Le Balcon seek to expand the possibilities for musical performance and consumption, and to that end, their innovative production features a first for medici.tv: a binaural recording. Grab your headphones for the full immersive experience!
Begun in 1977 and completed in 2003, Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Licht (meaning “light”) is a vast cycle of seven operas that last a total of 29 hours and seek to recreate the world. Each opera of the cycle is dedicated to a particular day of the week, symbolized by a planet and numerous other elements derived from mythology. Under the influence of Saturn and Saint Francis of Assisi, Samstag (Saturday)’s principal protagonist is Lucifer, the “bearer of light”. On stage, the opera is a true musical and visual blaze of constant wonder, performed here in two parts: the first at Paris’s Cité de la musique and the second at the Église Saint-Laurent-Jacques-Saint-Christophe.
Photo © Nieto